I am the planner in our family, and trips often get planned during the winter, when I get bored.
How they get planned depends on the trip.
We have a bucket list of places we both want to go, including several national parks. Those reservations need to be made a year out, so I have to do enough research to figure out where to stay very early, book the place(s), and then do other planning as it gets closer.
My husband really likes to take a trip to someplace warm in February, and we were alternating Hawaii with The Caribbean, but Hawaii is far and expensive, and we want to use our travel dollars on other places, so are cutting down on the number of trips there.
I like to get good deals, and take advantage of frequent flyer miles when I can.
We own a timeshare, and sometimes I just find a cheap vacation, and “go for it” without much planning. For example, once during December we paid less than $300 for a week in Las Vegas, got a rental car for about $130, and my husband (and a voucher of some sort to offset airfare. We said what the heck… we are not gamblers, but there is lots of hiking and other things to do around there, and we thoroughly enjoyed that spontaneous trip.
Lots of great ideas, thanks so much.
I do not want to sound like a wet blanket because I love all of these ideas. We are not drinkers, I mean we don’t have anything against it but H never drinks. Alcoholics in his family and he drinks so rarely that it would be pretty much never. So a wine country vacation, no bueno.
I read where someone talked about people who are reluctant travelers and a lot of it is about control and being out of their routine. I am trying really hard to push a vacation this year because H took so little time off last year that it came to the attention of his boss and HR. We’ve been married for 30 years so I’m used to him but I really need to make this happen.
I’d love to take a cruise to Alaska but we would have to leave our wonderful northern Michigan summer and I can’t figure out Alaska and no June to September. One of our neighbors did it a couple of years ago and while they liked Alaska, they regretted not being home in the middle of our good weather.
My husband does like to scuba dive, we went to Cayman a couple of years ago and he loved it. I don’t dive and am a bit afraid of the water. I would go again but would like to go somewhere else. H likes sightseeing, we did Italy also and that was a great trip.
I sometimes see all the things that we wouldn’t want to do and have trouble finding the things we would want to do together.
We have been to Univeral. I’m afraid that after H’s neck fusion, he can no longer do roller coasters and we love roller coasters. I think Disney is tame enough for him, although he’s a little hesitant about that. But I have to navigate his reluctantance.
Are you OK with cold weather or would you prefer to go somewhere warm? I ask because Iceland is amazing and the airfares are typically very low. May would be a great month to go to Iceland…
We do a couple of things.
We have a quasi-timeshare (we own 1/5 of a condo) out west so some vacations are planned around when we can make it there,
We also plan family trips. D1’s BF is likely worklng this summer at cool place we’ve never been so we might go there for a week.
DW and also do long-term planning for bigger trips. In 2017, we walked the length of Hadrian Wall (94+ miles over 8 days) In 2020 we are doing the Coast-to-Coast Walk in England (190 miles in 15 days). We do this trips the easy way where we working with a company that arranges lodging each night and moves our bags from place to place.
I have taken to planning out “second tier” stops to include if time permits after the must-sees of an itinerary. I’ve used these alternatives on multiple occasions when the original plans just weren’t as enjoyable or time consuming as I thought they would be. Some of my favorite stops have ended up being these “non-essentials”.
When possible, I figure the number of days needed to visit a place, then add one more day to the stay. Then I don’t fret if travel arrangements are delayed and I feel that I can relax and enjoy every minute of a place when I know I have a cushion of time available. I don’t like rushing from city to city, venue to venue, or site to site.
Iceland is intriguing. Would probably go in the fall instead of spring. I really need to get my roof replaced as soon as it gets warm enough so I’m afraid that it might be May. I usually have snow on the ground until the middle of April. My insurance agent recommended that we wait until temperatures are above 40
If you loved Italy, how about Greece and Crete? Or Portugal? Maybe somewhere in South America? We just got back from Thailand where prices are pretty low. It was over 70 (80 in Bangkok) the whole time in January. There are definitely warm places in non-summer months.
I like to have a reason (really an “excuse”) to go to a particular place, and build a vacation around the alleged reason. For example we just got back from a week in Arizona, visiting family in Scottsdale and an overnight in Sedona. The excuse was attending the Barrett/Jackson car auction, which I did on one day and was something I have talked about for years. Late September we had a wonderful week in Colorado. The excuse for that was me running in a 5k race in Crested Butte CO. Last summer our 2 week trip to Israel and Italy ended with us attending a family wedding in Tuscany. Next weekend we are going to NYC to participate in Cycle for Survival fundraiser for Memorial Sloan Kettering. Wife figured if we can go to CO for a 5k race then we can go to NYC for a spin event. So… give me an “excuse” and I will go there. I have been mulling over a trip to Europe that would involve going to pro basketball games with players we have watched play in college.
Okay what are the chances that someone else is looking at a Baltic Cruise? It’s through the new Ritz cruise line and it goes to St Petersburg for 3 years.
How I do it right now? We are Marriott Platinum Elite Ambassadors and we rack up tons and tons of points. We like to look online at the nicer hotels - Ritz, JW Marriott, etc. and pick locations based on that. An expensive vacation is a lot more practical when you don’t pay for nice lodging and stay on the concierge floor.
I’m not interested in staying anywhere that isn’t as nice as my house.
A nice vacation with a little cultural twist from your area would be Montreal. Did you say fall? - early October would probably be not summer but not cold. Beautiful, good outside opportunities, food, second language in action, etc.
Also NYC in the fall - or pair NYC with Boston or something.
My H has no interest in traveling besides our cottage. None. Disney would be his worst nightmare! (Admittedly, not my cup of tea either). I guess if I’m planning a trip with our money I would want it to be somewhere he could warm up to.
I love traveling and researching new places. Usually the process goes something like - something sparks an interest in a new place (eg, friend goes to Tanzania and posts pics to Facebook). I go to the library and get 3 travel guides on Tanzania plus why not pick up South Africa and Kenya while I’m thinking about that general region. Spend a couple of weeks thinking about a future trip to Tanzania. Talk hubby into adding it to our eventual ‘to-do’ list (or not… he’s still not on board with Peru for instance).
Then we kind of rough out our next couple of years of trips, although this changes up until we get the plane tickets. But we do have a list of a number of places we both want to go, and of that list, we kind of know which ones our kids are more interested in, and also which ones would work well for a summer trip vs which ones we should wait on until the kids are out of the house and we have time to travel in the off-season.
Once we know for sure where we are going on an upcoming trip I use TripAdvisor plus the books plus airbnb to pick the actual itinerary, lodging, etc. And hubby does a lot of it as well (esp. the airbnb part but also figuring out transportation… like trying to work out whether it makes more sense for 5 of us to rent a car vs travel by train in Europe this coming summer).
In your case I’d start by brainstorming places you want to go/things you like to do (write down a list); same for your hubby. See where you have things overlap. And then figure out for the month you can go, which destination makes sense this year and what you should save for another year when you can go a different month.
(If you just want a little Disney but not the whole trip centered around it - you could try one of Los Angeles/SoCal, Paris, Tokyo, or Hong Kong…)
I am a big fan of fall travel. The desert southwest is great in October, as is northern California. Looks like you want to avoid stress but don’t mind crowds. Monterey Peninsula combined with San Francisco, or Sedona and the Grand Canyon? The hotels on the rim are quite nice and it is pleasant to walk the rim trail while driving to various viewpoints. Vancouver BC is another fall destination with amazing food and ferry rides to Victoria, though cooler.
London and Paris are another easy combination, with side trips to Mont San Michel and Omaha Beach.
I’m the main trip planner in our household. We’ve been doing a number of cruises.
That said, OP - check with Costco Travel. Our upcoming trip is a cruise in French Polynesia. Regretfully Costco doesn’t contract with our favorite cruise line so had to book thru a different agent. But…we booked a package with Costco for before and after the cruise. They handled everything. Pick up from airport, transport to hotel. Pickup next day from hotel with transfer to ferry. Ferry is booked. Takes us to neighboring island where we are picked up at the terminal and shuttled to the hotel. Hotel has extras for Costco members. We are then picked up and ferried back to the cruise terminal. At the end of the cruise, we are again collected by a Costco arranged transfer, taken to a hotel for two nights and then transported from there to the airport.
All of the above took two phone calls. If there is a problem I know Costco will be standing by to assist.
They have packages to Hawaii, the Caribbean, Caymans and even Europe. D booked her honeymoon to Hawaii thru them - all planned and worked perfectly.
I’ve also used the services of Cranky Concierge. They only handle air travel. They were able to find flights and book itineraries which I couldn’t find thru google flights, kayak etc. Yes, they do charge per ticket - different tiers depending on whether you’re trying to use points, pay cash or want flight monitoring. I’ve found them well worth the cost. Plus, they will keep you informed if anything changes and make the appropriate rebooking.
I am the travel planner in my family. My H and I have different ideas of our “ideal” vacation. We try to alternate what type of trip we take next. We also have a dance of my H complaining about the trips I plan before we go and coming home being so happy that we went.
The last two trips we did were things my H really wanted to do. One was a bareboat sailing charter trip. It’s his favorite type of trip. I loved that trip as well and I would like to go again but with the adult children. H would go again just the two of us. The weird thing is that he doesn’t usually like to repeat sailing destinations but he wants to go back again soon. The other trip last year was to a mountain cabin. He would do that trip again but I’m not in a hurry for that.
I plan the Europe trips. Like someone else mentioned I sometimes go to the library and browse the travel books. I have books on Ireland, Italy and Northern Spain on my coffee table. All locations I would like to go.
If I was going to Mexico or even Hawaii I would look into the Costco packages.
My friend and her H have done trips around Grand Slam tennis tournaments. They have included some other tennis tournaments. Last year they went to Italy and included a couple of days at the Italian Open.
I could not get my H to go to Disneyworld. He is not an amusement park person and he hates crowds.
My SIL and BIL have worked out a great process. They jointly decide on a location. He researches the detailed itinerary, she researches the hotels. They discuss and make final decisions. It’s worked for them all over the world.
I am envious - I am the sole planner and planning is tiring! At this point in my life, my favorite trips are returns to old favorites. Planning consists of updates and filling in gaps - not starting from scratch.
I’m planning an independent trip to England and Scotland right now. The tickets have been purchased. I know what I want to see. I just need to plan the route and decide how many days to spend in which place.
I loved my last trip to Europe when I did the Camino (no reservations at the albergues) and then toured the rest of northern Spain by car. It was so easy. We used Booking.com in the morning, when we knew where we’d be that night or we’d just pull into a parador (which always seemed to have vacancies).
I’m concerned England and Scotland may be more crowded and spur of the moment traveling may not be possible.
But it’s fun to read about the various places and do the planning. On these rainy weekends we seem to be having lately.
I enjoy the travel planning and the research. In terms of deciding where to go and what to do it really depends on the type of trip. We have taken many road trips from NY to places in Canada and Maine and frequently spend time in the Berkshires. We were in Portugal for a road trip in June and we are planning a trip in CA in June for a wedding in Big Sur. Have those reservations but need to start making more specific flight plans and itinerary for how long, etc. I head to the library for my travel planning and will take out several guidebooks. I will also read travel forums and trip reports on both Trip Advisor and Fodors. I might look at Rick Steves site to see the destinations that are included in his tours to help in my itinerary planning. Haven’t done tours except as day trips from specific locations, Victoria and Buchardt Gardens on a day tour from Vancouver which made sense given where ferry terminals were situated in both Vancouver and Vancouver Island for example and in June, trip to Sintra, Cascais and a stop at the westernmost part of continental Europe from Lisbon which worked well and tour guide very informative. Although I had researched various options online, in both of those instances I let the hotel concierge make the arrangements. I will research restaurants but don’t necessarily make dinner reservations in advance although have done so if travelling and anniversary or birthday falls during the trip.I am pretty big believer in asking hotel concierge or in case of recent trip to Portugal hotel front desk for recommendations. This worked exceptionally well in Portugal as we enjoyed many fine meals and we usually try to stay in area of hotel as not looking to travel all over city for dinner. Have taken a few cruises, not a big cruiser but the Alaska cruise experience is really so worthwhile and outstanding. A river cruise is on my agenda!
I use a variety of travel books and just my general knowledge of things I want to see. Rick Steves books cover what Rick Steves deems worth seeing. Your desires may be different. For example, his England books suggest going down in mines. I have zero interest in mines. But he leaves out places like Highclere and Wimbledon, which are specific interest of mine.
You mentioned Germany in your original post. Visiting the Rhine is a classic trip that would be delightful in the fall. It’s super easy to do with the trains and transports on the river. You could do it inexpensively on your own rather than a full river cruise.
@TatinG - depending on when you are traveling, you may run into trouble without reservations in Scotland, especially if you are wanting to do the Hebrides. There were no vacancy signs all over Skye and the area in the summer.